Peaceful moments

Watching someone you love sleep is lovely.

You wonder what they are dreaming as they breathe in an out.

The slight movement on their lips, their eyes flickering behind closed eyelids and their chest moving up and down. I stroke his foot and a gentle smile pours from his lips.

He drifts into consciousness and looks at me.

It is a good feeling.

It is an intimate moment.

I feel loved.

In a whirlwind of fruit and cake

Im quiet again.

Which can only mean one thing...

A lifetime of telling people that Im tired or that I have a headache doesnt work with the two people that I most want to hide from. They have long deciphered the code and become aware of what it actually means. Which is great, but also very annoying.

I was told today that the 'display for fruit-cakeness' is actually written on my forehead as a frown. Great! I cant even bloody hide that anymore!

My fruitcake moments cresecendo into a whirlwind of emotions.

Every second of every waking moment, I think a thousand thoughts; and when I am asleep, I dream a thousand thoughts. Everything and every possible scenario is played through my head. Actually its a wonder I have enough energy to do anything. There are days when I am mentally tired from all the thinking I do.

I am thousands of miles away, and it only seems now that I am reaching some kind of clarity. Its the same message that has been trying to get through to me for a while now. That perfection isnt possible and trying for it makes you feel like a faliure. This is the message. Do you think I have realised this? I can tell you logically, but in my heart I keep thinking that if I do a little bit more, or a little bit harder then everything will be alright. You and I know that it doesnt work like this.

And so, for a while now I have been underachieveing. Of course, if you dont try, you dont fail do you! Underachieving is the other end of the scale of obsession. I have gone form one end of the see-saw to the other and actually I think its a rubbish game. Try to hard and you fail, try to little and you fail because you dont even get to do it. And so, here is the formulaic equation

High expectations+over-reliance on perfection=fail
Low expectations + no reliance on perfection = unachieving+ fail

(Both scenarios) + worrying = fruitcake syndrome

The whirlwind of Fruitcake always lifts me up in such a frienzy that I feel powerless and the first symptom is a lack of speech, its a shutdown, a numbness, a withdrawl. Its the last thing I want to do, because it is so obvious to those who have deciphered it. It would be great if they didnt know and I could be a fruicake in my own little world, but I have tried, its just how it happens.

Sigh

So, how am I going to get this message through my very thick skull?

I am going through transition period. The old me has gone and the new me isnt here yet. I am neither catterpiller nor butterfly. I am an inbetween uncomfortable phase where I dont know what is happening. I have to wait.

I have to in the mean time, cut off the thoughts that keep telling me the following.
1. You cant run fast enough or for longer.
2. You cant learn to fly.
3. You cant lose weight.
3. You are not good enough to write your first novel.
4. You cant do your job to the best ability
5. You should play your whole life safe.

It reminds me of the Bible story of the 3 men who are given talents. The last one wastes them because he is too frightened of what could happen. He is frightened of losing what he has and so therefore buries it in order to preserve it. What he ends up having is a life wasted and a life being frightened. I can tell you know, he isnt rewarded and ends up losing what he tried so hard to preserve.

Sigh.

Coconut needs a big hammer.

Im off to find one. :)

An accumilation of fears

Its interesting how many fears you can develop as a child that continue to annoy you well into adulthood.

To be afraid of spiders, fear of water, fear of heights, fear of large dogs. Where do all these come from?

I am sure that most of the fears I accumilated as a child have no reason to be in my adult life, but still they remain.

Today, for example, we went swimming. I cant put my face under the water and if someone splashes water up my nose, I panic and I cant breathe. Its wierd I know, but I cant help it.

I also have a fear of large dogs, which is why I would like a Daschund (small and unable to knock you off your feet) Which is what happened to me as a child!

I am also scared of the 'You see..I told you' look/conversation. Maybe this is why I am reluctant to start anything new...just in case the 'You see..I told you' voice starts ringing in my ears.

Thank goodness I have people in my life that make me do things that ordinarily I wouldnt. I can be quite a stubborn thing sometimes - as well they know!

Anyway, I think its about time I left these fears behind. Who knows...maybe the 'You see..I told you' may be used for some positive!

Cuando...

Cuando te rompa el corazon, siempre hay algo alli que duele si lo tocas.

Cuando caen lagimas como una fuente, siempre hay una cosa que lo vuelve a repitir.

Cuando no hay palabras, aparecen milles de pensamientos.

Cuando no sabes que hacer, siempre hay muchos caminos.

Cuando quieres correr, siempre hay muchoas razones para quedarte.

Cuando tienes que esperar no hay manera.

A new day

Ok, I am here again after a while.
I didn't go anywhere.
I was just kind of wandering around in my own thoughts.

Too many things going around in my head to write. But....at the start of my holiday I feel ready to 'deal' or rather 'forget' all the stuff that has happened at work+friends+life and start again.

And breathe...and reboot.

So, today...

I ran 3km. Funny isn't it. When I started out I couldn't even run for a whole minute. The cigarettes in my bag were calling me to take another slow drag and the chocolates were calling even louder. And now, after 4 months the cigarettes still call to me, but I have something back to say to them...I am working on what to say to the chocolates though!

And so I ran today and it felt good.

Its all preparation for the 10km race in September. My sister and I ran the 5km at the end of June and it was amazing. Amazing because we ran non stop and amazing because we did it. It wasn't about how fast we could do it. In fact, as we started, we made a pact to stop after a while and enjoy it, but as 5 minutes turned into 9 and 13 minutes turned into 21, it was as if both of us were thinking the same thing.
"Could we carry on running a little further?"
"Could we keep going?"

Well, we did, and after 43 minutes, we ran like rockets across the finishing line into the arms of both our other halves who praised us. We felt like we had come first. We did. It was certainly a first for both of us.

And so what now? Well, keep running I suppose. I'm eating good food, reading books I enjoy and not consuming my life with negative people or benign television. I am writing again. And all and all it feels good.

I don't know how far I have yet to go, but I know I have come quite far.

The wonderful nothing moments

I am sitting here loving the nothing specialness of it all.

All I am doing is listening to music whilst my love is washing up.

Very ordinary, nothing special.

But the moment is here and its a wonderful nothing moment.

Nothing is happening, but something is happening.

All these wonderful nothing moments make up a special moment.

The story of the ordinary.

Dusk is here. An ordinary dusk. An everyday dusk.

The birds are singing a dusk song. They have had their day. An ordinary day perhaps. They sing of their day.

There is quiet and peace and a sense of not wanting.

It feels like being underwater and looking around before you run out of breath and lift your face out of the water and breath in the oxygen deeply. Its the moment only longer. There is nothing before and nothing after. Its just now.

Its the being happy in the now.

I am happy in the now, and it feels good.

No, it feels better than good. It feels wonderful.

In love with the beauty of tragedy

How do you catch a star?
Do you wait for one?
Night after night, do you plead?

Do you plan?

Do you beg?

Do you buy nets and telescopes and jam-jars?
Do you read books and and recipes?
Do you wait and prepare?


When you lose hope, do you console yourself with falsehoods?
Do you cry, do you sob?
Morning after morning, do you breathe in air which has no benefit?
Does time pass whilst filling the heart with sadness?
Do you numb your soul by placing it in a cage?

Do you after a while realise the beauty in the tragedy?
Do you understand that you cant catch a star?
Do you gaze at the wonder of it, and appreciate and be thankful?
Do you breathe in the sheer wonder of it?
Do you realise you can never catch it?

After this all, do you see it shoot suddenly across the sky?
Do you see it fall gently in the palm of your hands?
Do you close your eyes?
Do you cup your hands gently to look after the fragility of it?
Can you believe?
Do you dare to believe?
Do you allow yourself to believe?

Can you?

Happiness

Its the most simple things that make me happy...

Eyes that smile...

Warm arms around you as you sleep...

A smell that invokes a thousand memories...

A sigh that lets someone know you are happy...

Loving...

Laughing...

Living...

The Unexpected Moments in Life

This is part of my story.

It is not a simple one, and neither is the story that you have.
It is filled with ups and downs and swings and roundabouts.
"Sometimes you're up and sometimes you're down, and sometimes you're just going around and around."

Sometimes in the world we live in, if we are lucky enough to catch the moment, we receive something unexpected. It may be when you are least expecting it. It can happen in the opening of a door, or a phone call. Mostly it happens in the unexpected moments of the day. The most ordinary.

I wish I could tell you when and where my life changed. I feel that it is based on a series of unexpected events that have pushed me through the most happiest and the most painful of times.

Like the time... I met my oldest sister. She is me, but we are not born of the same family. We met whilst on an unexpected walk we were both on as part of a group. We walked through bluebells (and not bluebirds as I thought I heard!!!) She told me I was like a dragon breathing fire inside a small box at everyone that came near me. She knew that after an hour's walk! What else could she know. In the two years that I have known her, she has been one of my most valued voices in my heart and I love her.

Like the time... my little sister threatened to drive for over an hour with her two small children if needs be and come and kick my ass if I didn't pick up the phone. I had ignored all calls from everyone all evening and enough was enough in her eyes. I knew I had pushed her too far, and I knew. I know she would walk over hot coals for me.

Like the time...I met my love. I wasnt planning for what I have now, although I wished it with all my heart. From the first 'fruit-cake' moment when I wanted to fly, he grounded me. Which is completely ironic as he is a pilot and loves to fly. I don't have any words to tell him the love that I have for him, yet I know that he know, I look into his eyes and I am his and I am safe and I have all that I need at this moment in time. I sigh and so does he. All is well.

Many paths that we are on we don't choose, they are given to us. Some are born out of family and some out of circumstances. Many, if we have a choice, we wouldn't take. But take them we must. Sometimes the journey is good and sometimes, for a while, it can be nothing but pain and torture, but past that past, and looking back, we can learn a lot from it.

I remember a time when the thought of coming home made me cry, when I would look out of the window many nights in succession and question so many of my thoughts and actions and have so many regrets. I sit in the same home now a different person. How did I get here? The same four walls do not contain the same things inside. The treasure chest has a new treasure inside.

I have been blessed with a few people that have helped me through my journey so far. I know I still have far to go, but I have come even further to this point in time today.

My journey is mine and mine alone to take. I am the only person who has to make this journey. No one else can say the words that I need to say, no one else can breathe in the happiness that I have. Its all down to me. I know that now, and that has been a really hard lesson to learn.

The people who accompany my journey, do so because I allow them to, and believe me, I have been rubbish at allowing people close to me. I have made decisions based on an action or a person or a situation and then chose to project that on anybody else coming close to me.

But that is not who I am today. The people who have been their for me are few and far between, not because there wasn't an abundance, but because I did not allow them to be close enough to touch me. I was the fire-breathing dragon. I saw letting people in as a weakness, as a vulnerability. You let people in, they know too much, they have the power to hurt you.

I have learned that no one has the power to hurt you unless you let them. Nobody can guarantee you in life that you wont get hurt, but as part of your story, it makes you a better person.

The people who have helped me through 'the tunnel' as I call it, I ask myself what made them keep me company throughout the journey I have made. My younger sister, does she have to because she is my blood? My older sister, does she have to because she sees in me something I cannot? My trusted and dearest friends who started out as colleagues and changed into my dearest friends? My love who in the blink of the eye can recognise if I am quiet, and although that frightens me in so many ways, it fills my very being with more love than I can ever imagine and I feel safe and its OK.


These people did not save me. I am not who I am today because of these people. I am who I am today because I let these people walk with me and hold my hand. No one could do or say the things I had to say. But because they held my hand, they helped me to do all the things I needed to do. They gave me speech when I didn't have any words, they gave me wind so I could fly, they gave me tissues and food and patience and all the countless things that they thought was nothing, but meant the world to me.

This is the treasure in my heart.

And so, as I am making plans for the future, I know I have so much more inside my heart.

I am not who I was...I am who I am today.

My story is not over...it is only beginning...

The Little Bluebird in the Golden Cage

There once was a little bluebird in a golden cage.

It was a beautiful bird with long sapphire blue feathers. It dreamt every day to fly in high up in the white wispy clouds and dreamt every night to feel the wind on her tiny little face. But in reality, she lived in her golden cage from morning till night with just her wonderful dreams to pass the time. In her eyes, you could almost see her dreams, as the blue windows to her soul sparkled with happiness.

The story is coming

Im writing it now...

One step too far by Dido

You can sleep forever
But still you will be tired
You can stay as cold as stone
But still you won't find peace
With you I feel I'm the meek leading the blind
With you I feel I'm just spending wasting time

I've been waiting
I'm still waiting
I've been waiting
I've been waiting
I've been waiting
I'm still waiting
I'm with you (with you)
Its always one step too far
One step too far

You can walk too far
But still you won't be found
You can look down on the world
But still you won't find love
You won't find love

Only with mellow
Are you thin enough to slide through.
If the sun or the moon should give way to doubt,
They would immediately go out.
One swallow don't make a summer,
But tomorrow has to start somewhere.
Only with mellow
Are you thin enough to slide through.
Only with mellow
Are you thin enough to slide through.
Don't Let nothing ride you
Only with mellow
Are you thin enough to slide through.
Don't Let nothing ride you
One swallow don't make a summer.

I've been waiting
I'm still waiting
I've been waiting
I've been waiting
I've been waiting
I'm still waiting
I'm with you (with you)
It's always one step too far
One step too far

Today Coconut flew.

Monday 25th May 2009

Today Coconut flew.

Do you know what it’s like to be picked up by the wind like a dandelion seed? Do you know what it’s like to float on the breeze like a delicate bubble? I do.

I wished I had the words to describe what it feels like.
It’s like breathing in and breathing out at the same time.
It’s like time actually stopping, and past present and future joins together in a beautiful crescendo.

Today was a good day.
Today I flew. Now you can’t understand how this felt like unless you looked at yesterday.

Yesterday was not a good day.

Yesterday I was filled with so much negativity that it encompassed me and tried to drown me. Yesterday I was the coconut again and needed severe hammer and chiselling to stop it from staying closed and to be fully open again. The patience action worked thankfully and things slowly returned back to normal.

I have to tell you though that I am a positive person. I like to see the good in everything (I have been well ridiculed about this in the past). I like to be praised and give praise in abundance. I like to give and receive encouragement. I know how important these things are in building a person into the best person they can possibly be. I also know what it is to be starved of these emotions and what that then creates in you. Confidence is great when you have it, but when you misplace it, it can knock you off track and place you in a tunnel where the light is far from reach. Wise words told me once that ‘negativity breeds negativity’. Doesn’t it just!

And even with all this positivity, there are times when things are just too much. Well they are for me anyhow. A little thought here, another harmless thought there. And before you know it, there are no more little harmless thoughts wandering around. It’s just a big whirlwind of thoughts all be thought at the same time and revolving round and around. This is me during one of my ‘fruit-cake’ moments. I recognise the signs, my feet start twitching and if I am standing up, I am slowly backing myself away until I am against any corner or wall. My words become stuck in my throat and I cant seem to find the words to get them out.

Words are very important and to be able to express them is a great gift. To be understood is great. To understand is a greater gift. I am very lucky to have someone who has a great deal of patience to recognise the signs and defuse them with kindness and love.

Anyway, back to yesterday. It was my first day of flying in the South of France with the temperature around 33oc. Too little water, too little food and too much information. I couldn’t take it all in. Then to top it off, a simple practical task which seemed simple was too much for me. I felt inadequate and unable to it. I had primed myself before hand by reminding myself that it takes me a long time to do something and once I have it, then I’m usually very good. But with all this priming, and being in a new environment and with new people, it wasn’t enough to help. I had failed. I was not perfect. I was no good.

Back to today. The memory of yesterday was starting to creep into today. I was determined that it would not happen. Yes I was really scared, but could I dare to believe that I could do this? Cold I dare to believe in myself that it could be done. I watched the other student’s progress higher up the hill as I the small one waiting lower down for further practise.

With an almighty drag by my teacher, I started running, I ran and ran and my wing lifted up behind me, I carried on running until I was airborne (about 1 metre in the air) and then after turning left, I landed. I did it. I did it. I DID IT...

And then I did it again, and then again. I flew 4 times and was about 5metres above the ground. Now Im not very good at landing yet, and I seem to pull two breaks at the same time (which in paragliding is a HUGE NO) but I did it, and today that is enough.

The day has arrived finally

After waiting for what feels an eternity, today has arrived. no more 'eve eve eve' or 'just Wednesday'. Its here. Leaving Day.

Having the day off and getting an extra hour in bed certainly has made the difference. I survey the flat and wonder why again I have to tidy up. Its like having little pixies who create havoc in the middle of the night. Damn those pixies!

So, everything is ready. Well it is since I packed last Sunday. The thing is I washed various items which have to now stow away int he luggage. Mr W not going to be very happy.

So I hear you ask...'how are you going to fill your car with two paragliders, three people, some compulsory rations and some luggage. Well....I'm not sure, but Im not getting into that. I want to be able to sit tomorrow night outside surveying the wonderful landscape and ponder on what the week will bring. Its funny though, you spend a lot of time being excited about the event you are planning, and sometimes, the event doesn't live up to the anticipation.

I know I'm going to be on my own for most of the time as Mr W and friend will be flying around as they are experienced pilots already. Its me that feels like a baby0bird. Looking out of the nest and wondering what it will be like to fly, but knows that its going to take time. I suppose after being very good at my job, its back to be the inexperienced again. The little one. Sigh.

I know that this is probably the best experience that could happen to me at the moment. Its the unknown. Its out of my comfort zone. Its a risk, but its also trying not to listen to my parents who are filling my head with every worst case scenario that could happen.

All I know is that I don't know what will happen. It will be different and it will be what it will be.

Now enough pondering and get packing.

I'll let you know what happened... :)

Its just Wednesday today...

Paragliding is on Sunday at 9am in the French Alps. So is today Paragliding eve, eve, eve, eve...nope, acoording to Mr W, its just Wednesday...dammit

fed up arguing with him....hhrrmmpppfff

I have a dream

I used to be really great at work.

That's a lie actually...

I used to be brilliant.

Nothing was too much for me, nothing I couldn't do bigger and better than anyone else. I lived to work. Everything I touched turned to gold after some extremely hard graft.

But now...I don't seem to have it in me anymore. Don't get me wrong, I'm still really good at what I do. Its not trumpet blowing. I know that I have the ability to do what I do well.

But now, things have started to change. Things I used to be excited about, don't excite me anymore. The prospect of working all weekend doesn't fill me with pride, it fills me with dread. Maybe I have given all I have and maybe I don't have anything left to give. I know its not my age, as I have never let that bother me before. I suppose I have a new dream, and knowing me, once I make my mind up, I wont be satisfied until I get it.

I find myself thinking about new pastures and greener pastures. I know, the grass isn't always greener, but isn't it better to walk barefoot in the slight less greener grass, than to spend a lifetime wondering what things would have been like if you had only made that decision.

Its 6 days till I start my paragliding course. I may love it...I may hate it. Who knows? I know for certain that I will be rubbish at it for a while and then something will click and I will understand. I always understand after a bit of study. Not naturally clever me, have to persevere. I still hear my granny sticking up for me as an 8 year old child.

I have travelled a long way in a year. A year has taken me to places new and exciting and places where I have come to know myself for the first time. The people who have accompanied my journey have helped me to grow and nurtured me and let me be truly me. Who knows where my journey will take me in another year.

I hope to walk in Lemon groves and feel the sunshine on my neck before my loved one kisses me and I turn to smile towards him and be happy how lucky I am...

I have a dream...

Why can't you hiccup bubbles?

What are hiccups? I am a random hiccuper...I can be literally doing nothing and then suddenly out of the blue, I can be hiccuping for a couple of minutes and then it goes away.

The best bit is when I get out of bed with hiccups. That means that I will have hiccups all day. My dad used to say when I was little that every time I hiccuped I grew a tiny little bit...well at 34 years old and 5'4'' , that wonderful story didn't come true...shame...

...which started me thinking why things happen?

I had a dream last night. As dreams go, it was rather weird. I was standing at the top of a very windy and cold large hill with a plastic faded duck as a birdbath and frogspawn all around it (told you it was weird). I had arrived there after some exciting event that had happened in my dream, what I cant remember because the nature of dreams are that you seem to forget their very essence the moment you wake up...why is that? Are they the key to some elixir that we are not meant to know?

Anyhow back to the duck and the frogspawn...something of great importance fell down this hill. I say hill, but it was a sheer decline of about 80%. I knew that this thing that had fallen, I can't remember but it was shaped in a rectangle...a book?...a frame?...I cant remember...I knew that this was very bad news as it was the thing we had come to rescue. I think it was meant to be there as another event would happen as a result of it being there (too much time-travelling reading on my part I think).

I looked down at this hill for sometime and knew logically that I couldn't go down, that the laws of physics were against me. I even saw someone try and fail and tumble to (I think) their apparent death, if not into a million pieces!

Even so, I know that it was important and I knew what my decision had to be. I knew that I had to rescue it whatever the cost. I knew that I had to try. I knew it was up to me. I went to move...

...and then in my dream I felt arms from behind me grab me around my waist to stop me...

...and I woke up and felt arms behind me grab me around my waist...

I had woken up from my dream at the exact moment I was about to jump...

I had been woken from my dream by the man who shares my love and my life.

The same man who looks into my eyes and makes me feel that no words need to be said. That everything is understood, that emotions are synchronised...it is in that exact moment that I know I have everything I need.

The path that led me here has not been easy or well lit and there were many tunnels. But waking up and seeing the man whom you love with all of your heart and who you know loves you back with the same intensity makes any tasks worthwhile.

One can put up with a thousand demons for the sake of an angel...

My Sister

My sister is amazing.

I have such love and awe of her strength that any strength that I have pails into insignificance of the strength that she has.

I look back to the girl she once was and the woman she once was, and it is different to the person I see today.

I see not only strength, but sacrifice. I see passion, I see good, I see a mother, I see a woman, a warrior, a fighter, I see my sister, and i love her for everything that she was, is and will be...

She is my sister...she is one half of me...

Having a cold sucks!

AAAATTTIIISSSCCCHHOOOO...ah...crap

With one week to go to France paragliding I seem to have caught the slightly less pandemic flu strain of 'kid-flu' occupational hazard I suppose.

I also seemed to have aquired apathy and lethargy as added extras. I seem to have just enough effort to go and whinge next to BF who is playing guitar hero...my...head....

So no running today. I went yesterday. I am on week 6 which is phase 2.-2 minutes of running and 2 minutes of walking. Man alive it was hard, but worth it as when I came back and had another argument with my scales I decided to measure myself instead and found I have lost an inch off most of the places I have measured...how cool is that! Damn those scales!!!

Back to the paragliding. Have now ordered a helmet, have all my clothes, lots of mini travel shampoos etc and all I need now is Euros.

I am quite excited and am looking forward to it. I actually have no idea what I am doing, Ive read a bit of a book, but I dont think its going to prepare me for what it will actually be like. Last July I went on a tandem flight and I cant even describe the peace and beauty and awe of it all. BF has been great about it all, especially driving to Brighton last weekend just for me to try on a flying suit that I didnt even buy.

So... with a week left to go, I catch a cold and have been told to get better and that BF does not want to be infected by it...charming...he has a point though. Driving 10 hours to the south of France next weekend and I dont want to be coughing and sneezing all of the way. Isnt it typical though!

Im going to drink my hot honey and lemon tea now and be a good patient...ahem...

2 weeks left dun...dun....DAHHHHH

Ok...ok...two weeks to go till the big day...

I now have my paragliding trousers (2 pairs), three jackets (all in varying coldness design), ear muffs, sunglasses, boots, (spare boots) a variety of hoodies/jumpers/vests that I have accumalated and two rucksacks.

Now all I need is a helmet.

How I am going to get all of this into a bag I have NO idea. I think Im going to start packing next weekend!!